Their swelling sails, made of long sections of canvass laced together, vertically, at their edges, from stem to boom (thus differing from the Chinese, which are laced horizontally), were inscribed with immense crests and the heraldic devices of feudalism, many feet in diameter. Near the top were cross-wise bands or stripes of black. The junks of Satsuma could be distinguished by the white cross in a circle; those of Higo by the broad-banded ring. On one were two crossed arrow-feathers, on others the chess-board, the “cash” coin and palm-leaves, the butterfly, the cloisonné symbol, the sun, the fan, etc. Innumerable banners, gay with armorial designs or inscribed with Buddhist texts, hung on their staves or fluttered gaily as flags and streamers from the mastheads. Stuck into the back of many of the distinguished veterans, or officers, were the sashi-mono, or bannerets. Kato Kiyomasa, being a strict Buddhist, had for the distinctive blazon of his back-pennant, and on the banners of his division, the prayer and legend of his sect, the Nichirenites, “Namu miyo ho rengé kiō” (Glory to the Holy Lotus, or Glory to the salvation-bringing book of the Holy Law of Buddha). On the forward deck were ranged heavy shields of timber for the protection of the archers. These, at close quarters, were to be let down and used as boarding planks, when the sword, pike, and grappling-hook came into play. Huge tassels, dangling from the prows like the manes of horses, tossed up and down as the ships rode over the waves. Each junk had a huge eye painted at the prow, to look out and find the path in the sea. With the squadron followed hundreds of junks, laden with salt meat, rice-wine, dried fish, and rice and beans, which formed the staple of the invaders’ commissariat for man and horse. Transport junks, with cargoes of flints, arrows, ball, powder, wax candles, ship and camp stores, “not forgetting a single thing,” sailed soon after, as well as the craft containing horses for the cavalry.